Optimism in the Workplace and Why It's a Superpower Leaders Must Possess

Earlier this February, Delta Air Line's CEO, Ed Bastian, sent an email to customers. It was part apology and 'thank you' addressing the disruptions to travel caused by major snowstorms in the Midwest and Northeast. It is said that more than 5,000 flights were canceled across all airlines.

Although, the disruption caused by a few days of bad weather appears minor, when your business is entirely reliant on people moving from one location to another, this makes for a significant problem.

Bastian wrote, "If you have flown with us recently and have experienced disruptions to your travel plans, I want to thank you for your trust, patience, and loyalty." It goes on to say, "Our operation continues to stabilize following a number of unprecedented challenges, including one of the most difficult holiday environments we've ever faced as a result of the omicron variant and a series of winter weather events."

What came after stuck out to me:

"Despite these disruptions, we remain optimistic about what's ahead."

Those words struck a chord because they encapsulate two critical business truths:

1. Disruptions are uncontrollable. To make things bearable when they do come, is to anticipate them as part of your risks and prepare contingencies. We will never know when they will arise or their magnitude, but careful planning will prevent us from getting cut off on our knees.

2. How we respond is impactful. When we are prepared, our response will be immediate and impactful. You can choose to react to disruptions with fear and anxiety or receive them with confidence and optimism.

To this, I've long believed that optimism is a superpower. More than Plan B, Plan C, etc., it enables you to seek a way out of a difficult situation without succumbing to it. Optimism presupposes that something better will come along in the future and motivates us to pursue it.

As a leader, cautious optimism is a critical trait for motivating your team and executing your business's vision. You may have a well-conceptualized plan but what’s more important are the people behind its implementation. This is true even when you are not in a crisis, but it is an especially valuable quality when you are.

It's not at all difficult nor is it complicated. One of the most effective strategies for leading a team through difficult times is to instill hope that things will improve and cultivate an atmosphere for growth. The possibility of that chance is enough to keep everyone focused on the mission – one step at a time.

And that is more paramount than the plan.

Source: https://news.delta.com/message-skymiles-members-ceo-ed-bastian-innovating-travels-future

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/02/03/us/winter-storm-snow-ice#winter-storm-flight-cancellations

JCVA HQ: Transforming Awkward to Awesome

In our previous article, we discussed Brené Brown & Barrett Guille’s take on the new office dynamic in a podcast episode aptly named, The Great Awkward. We shared how the pandemic has affected the workforce, and how we are all hanging on two years later.

Today, we go over how we, at JCVA, have remained adaptable and resilient throughout this period—starting with how our headquarters was built to accommodate the evolving needs of the times and more recently, how our team management refreshed our people engagement program to help our guys overcome this awkward phase.

Going Hybrid

Jase and I started dreaming about our office space in May 2021. Yes, during the height of the pandemic. I was initially reluctant to commit to a physical space because A) PANDEMIC and B) our small back office team has been fine working from our homes. However, as our operations expanded, the need to grow our support team became inevitable… so is the need for space and a corporate home base.

We wanted a manageable office size in a low-density building and happily found it in Quezon City and most importantly, within our BIR RDO. As for the design, we worked closely with architect and designer, Paul Martinez, and tasked him to make it look fresh, slightly unorthodox, comfortable, and luxe. Paul presented us with Modern Classic, Biophilic and Modern Industrial theme options, with the last one edging the others out. This was later tweaked with mid-century modern and biophilic elements.

With our look and concept finalized, we got onto completing the details. Whoever said that love is in the details was spot on. We spent months trying to come up with the right look for our custom furniture, pinning down the correct shade of teal, and choosing the best fabric for our lounge sofas. These are just a few of the myriad decisions that were made in the process of achieving our dream office.

We also sought advice from a feng shui consultant to help us harmonize with the environment and maximize good energy inside the space. GOOD VIBES ONLY.

From spiritual and metaphysical, we move on to physical wellness and sustainability. Our office was made with LEED-certified materials, offers high-end ergonomic chairs and standing desks to our team, has wide windows that allow natural light in, uses LED lights for when we need them, houses live plants that are somehow surviving despite my black thumb, offers the convenience of a private bathroom with shower, and lastly, features a generous pantry where our guys can enjoy breaks with unlimited coffee and rice (IMPORTANT).

To address issues brought by the pandemic, JCVA HQ was outfitted with fresh air and exhaust ductworks, uses ACUs installed with Plasma Quad Connect Air Purifying devices, and is equipped with thermal sensors, disinfectant fogging machine, and OH radical, plasma and UV-C technologies. We made sure that our safety equipment is redundant to keep our people healthy within the office.

Finally, to allow us to thrive with a hybrid work arrangement, we rigged out our meeting rooms with tech for better teleconferencing experience.

JCVA HQ is an extension of our home and hopefully, it will serve as an extension of our team’s homes as well. More than serving its utilitarian purpose, our office is where we want to plant and grow our culture and connect with one another.

Leading a Hybrid Team

With our new headquarters came the challenge of having the team transition back to a physical office from a remote work setup. Like what Brené Brown and Barrett Guille discussed in the podcast, this phase is awkward. There is so much that people have to get used to—new and old—like work commutes, health protocols, and in-person interactions.

We have to deal with shifting to a hybrid setup while also building company culture and making sure people are committed to their work. An added layer to this challenge is making sure our geographically dispersed team members feel included and engaged without having to set foot in our HQ.

With all of these obstacles, the HR and Marketing & Engagement teams decided to relaunch our employee community thread, Heads Up.

In project sites, when you want to call people’s attention, you say “heads up!”. Like its name origin, Heads Up started as an internal communication project where company announcements were posted on Viber. We didn’t want to stop there. Our team was growing and we needed JCVA to be a workplace where everyone knew each other and had fun.

Through Heads Up, we created a space where our team could let their hair down, or in our case, let their hard hats down (ba dum dum) and get to know each other on a more personal level. It also helps us put the spotlight on the team and the individuals that make it while providing a great avenue for communication and collaboration.

Heads Up has transformed from a Viber thread to a full-blown team engagement program. Once it becomes safer, we plan on supplementing it with events like Friday night socials, outreach programs, and face-to-face team building activities.

These are the first strides we have taken towards embracing a hybrid work model and making the JCVA HQ the keystone to a strong company culture. We’re sure there are other things we have to navigate as we move forward but equipped with insights from industry leaders and wisdom from our own personal journey in the last two years, we are confident that we can turn awkward into awesome.

We can hurdle past this awkwardness with a bit of elbow grease, a lot of empathy, some compromise, and a boatload of understanding that we really have to make the workplace a little more human.

Improving the Air We Breathe in our Spaces

Previous pandemics have all been critical historical events that have changed how cities are built worldwide.

Public parks and green spaces have been added as well as new building standards to keep people from overcrowding. These changes have also made it easier for people to breathe and get enough light and ventilation in their homes.

Architects, landscape architects, planners, urban designers, and policymakers have been imagining how our cities might look in the future. Here at JCVA, we're weighing in too.

In our homes: isolation areas

You may not have given much thought to indoor air quality before 2020, but the pandemic has highlighted the importance of keeping all areas of your home clean and safe, including the air.

Headaches, irritation of the ears, nose, throat, and dizziness are minor side effects of poor indoor air quality. However, more serious consequences include cancer and respiratory diseases if we continuously take the importance of air quality for granted.

One way to improve the air quality in your home is to use a good air purifier. There are multiple air purifiers available in the market today that may suit your budget. However, experts recommend a three-pronged approach: filter the air, introduce fresh air, and manage humidity.

For commercial establishments: good ventilation

Another big concern is how Covid-19 could spread through heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems (HVAC), primarily used in commercial buildings and apartments.

Health experts advise making changes to existing HVAC systems and how to use supplementary methods, such as increasing fresh air volume and decreasing recycled air consumption by using air cleaning equipment with HEPA filters or UV light.

Our long-term solution would involve natural ventilation being used whenever practical, and displacement ventilation (rather than traditional recirculation) should be used where HVAC systems are utilized.

For schools and offices, open-plan environments is a problem because of infection transmission indoors

This can be solved by a hybrid model for learning and working and would lead to the reintroduction of smaller cubicle workspaces in office buildings and a shift away from open-plan learning environments to return to smaller, cellular classrooms in schools in the future.

The community: open spaces

Another place where virus transmission occurs is mainly found in restaurants and cafes. Changes to local bylaws to allow al fresco dining is a short-term solution, but in the future, we envision changes to the street design (such as narrowing existing carriageways or introducing more pedestrian-only streets, widening footpaths, and adding verandahs) This could be made to allow more widespread outdoor dining.

Overall, the necessity to limit personal movements and prevent the virus from spreading will likely lead to a more cellular approach to home and neighborhood architecture, focusing on establishing self-sustaining communities.

Making our spaces and homes safe again is not a lateral journey for every community affected. But bringing safety back to our lives requires changes that not only could afford us short-term methods but hopefully opt to utilize self-sufficiency at a neighborhood level.

Sources: Easy ways you can improve indoor air quality, Harvard Health